One of the best Real-TIme Strategies ever.
The bulk of the game is the campiagn mode. The campaigns are really long and take at least a few days to complete, more likely closer to a week. Each faction starts off with at least 1 city while others can have 2 or 3. The campaign is played in turns where during each turn you can recruit units, construct buildings, repair damaged buildings, retrain fallen units, move armies across the map, and use agents. Military units train in one turn where constructing buildings takes between 1 and 6 turns depending on the building. For example, building large walls or irrigating farms take between three and six turns while simple buildings like dirt roads and leather makers take only one turn. While moving your units across the map they can only go a certain distance before having to stop and rest for a turn. Agents consist of merchants who increase your trade income, priests who spread religion to your citizens, spies who infiltrate fortresses and show you enemies defences, diplomats who forge alliances and negotiate trade rights, and assassins who kill important enimies like generals or sabotage buildings.
Each city has an income of florins (the games currency) that are effected by trade, farming, population, and taxes. Trade is increased by upgrading roads and researching markets, farming income can change depending on the seasons harvest, and taxes can be raised or lowered during your turn which in turn can either raise or lower your citizens happiness. If you don't keep your citizens happy they can riot and rebel against you and become a rebel settlement. Happiness of your citizens depends on how well your preists spread your religion, the cities amount of corruption, the amount of units garrisoned in your town, amount of taxes, and certain buildings improve happiness and public order.
The campaign is also full of historic events. During the campaign after a certain amount of turns Europe will be invaded by the Mongols, effected by the Black Plauge, discover gunpowder, participate in crusades called by the pope, and set off to explore the new world.
The games combat is fantastic. During the campaign you can choose to fight battles out on the map under your control or choose to simulate them. When fighting battles out, there is so much to admire. The graphics are great each unit has certain armor, defence, attack, speed, and certain bonuses like increased attack in the woods or snow. You can zoom in on the action to see the fighting up close and its amazing. Each single man uses different moves, reacts to situations differently, and fights differently while battling. If your attack is not doing so well some units may lose hope and run away allowing you to chase them down for easy kills or you can capture them and ransom them back to the other faction.
Medieval does take a pretty good computer to really be able to participate in many battles and while it doesn't completely lack multiplayer, You can only fight your friends in battles and not face off in the campaign. All in all, Medieval 2: Total War is a truly great game, it gets a 9.5 in my book. A must buy for anyone with a decent computer.